Trump’s fate depends on Court he picked

 

Gordon L. Weil

Donald Trump got the Supreme Court he wanted. 

He will now discover how it will make its way between solid conservatism, political partisanship and the historical opportunity to determine the presidential election, possibly costing him a return to the White House.  The Court’s reputation is at stake.

This moment recalls the Court having picked the president in 2000, when it handed George W. Bush a narrow victory over Al Gore.

Trump faces in 2024 more major legal challenges than all previous ex-presidents together.  The biggest questions could either end his chances or give him a critical boost.

The latest case involves the Colorado Supreme Court decision that he cannot run in the Republican primary there because he participated in an insurrection against the U.S., culminating in the attack on the Capital on January 6, 2021.  The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution bans from federal or state office any office holder involved in an insurrection.

The Colorado court examined three questions.  First, does the president hold an “office” covered by the Amendment?  Second, was January 6 an insurrection or merely a riot?  Third, did Trump’s actions and statements constitute participation in an insurrection?  Colorado said “yes” to all three and ruled Trump off the ballot.

If the Supreme Court majority disagrees with the Colorado court on even one of these questions, keeping Trump off the ballot anywhere almost certainly would fail.

A second key case involves the Trump claim that he is immune from prosecution for virtually anything he did while president.  In a 1974 case involving Richard Nixon, still president at the time, the Court ruled that his immunity did not extend to acts beyond his official duties.  Were Trump’s efforts to undermine the state-certified electoral votes a part of his presidential duties?

If the Supreme Court gives Trump absolute immunity, the federal case against his alleged constitutional violations, being heard in Washington, would be severely damaged.  If it denies him full immunity, it might in effect be deciding the case against him by eliminating his best defense.

These two cases could deal with most important legal challenges to his campaign.  But they would not necessarily affect the federal case in Florida about his taking top secret documents with him when he left Washington, the Georgia case about his election interference there or the New York civil case about his providing false financial information.

The media is fond of noting that Trump’s re-election effort seems to be unharmed by the many cases brought against him.  Of course, he has not yet been finally convicted of anything relevant.  And the torrent of cases, whatever the justification for their timing, can readily appear to his supporters as an opposition vendetta.   Will final court decisions change that?

If the Supreme Court acts as courts often do, it will seek to decide the bare minimum necessary and leave alone other questions.  If it is a more political than judicial body, it could be expansive and do Trump a lot of good (or harm, though that’s not likely).

In the Colorado case, it might decide that insurrection meant the Civil War when the Amendment was adopted, but that it has not otherwise been defined.  Colorado alone cannot create that definition; that’s for Congress to do and it hasn’t.  Trump remains on the ballot.

In the immunity case, the Court could decide against Trump, based on the Nixon precedent.  The former president accepted that adverse ruling, even though it meant he was likely to be convicted in the Senate by the votes of his own party, leading him to resign.

The Court probably understands that a conservative body denying Trump his best protection would send a strong message to his supporters that he may have violated the law.  By allowing the Court of Appeals to rule first, the Supreme Court may rely on the lower-court ruling, protecting itself from seeming to be simply a partisan player.

Taking action affecting Trump’s political future puts pressure on the Court.  Senate Republicans turned against Nixon, showing that punishing a president must be bipartisan.   But, with few exceptions, GOP senators did not reject Trump after his second, overwhelmingly partisan impeachment.  The Court, like the Senate, must now make similar decisions.

Advocates asking the Court to harshly judge Trump by interpreting the Constitution and laws to punish him may be short-sighted. Whatever happens to him could happen to any successor.

The Constitution, though much revered, is much distorted by partisan practice.  The Court has sometimes shared in the responsibility for that.   Now it faces tough judgments.  The answer about whether there was an insurrection cannot be found in the law. It will be the judgment of just nine, unelected people.

At their core, the Trump cases this year should turn not only on his actions but also on protecting the Constitution.

 

Defense bill, COP 28 mislead people

Gordon L. Weil

A funny thing happened to the promise made by the COP28 environment conference to “transition” away from fossil fuels.  You know, that’s the stuff that makes most of our cars go.

It went out the exhaust pipe when it encountered the recent U.S. defense spending bill that will lay out tens of millions for a new parking garage at BIW.

The international community has set a target of limiting the increase in the world’s temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-global warming level. According to science, if this limit is not achieved, the quality of life on Earth is harmed.  Accomplishing this goal requires a reduction in the use of fossil fuels and their eventual elimination.

The most effective way to cut gasoline usage is to drive less.  Replacing private vehicles by mass transportation, including car pooling, would cut down on total auto use and emissions that cause global warming.  Yet federal money encourages private vehicles instead of developing more and better mass transit facilities.

At the same time as the U.S. advocates the fossil fuel phase-out, the defense bill supports motor vehicle usage.  Politicians may talk a good game, but they prefer to cater to our immediate wants instead of our long-term needs.  That’s not how leadership is supposed to work.

Unfortunately, in reality, building a new BIW parking garage to encourage commuting does not conflict with the COP28 outcome.  Its so-called transition from fossil fuel includes a raft of ready-made excuses for not making the goal.  Besides, the transition would only deal with energy production.  It doesn’t touch motor vehicles.

COP28 took days of negotiation to come up with just the right language that could both make it appear that the world cared about global climate change and satisfy the oil producers who hovered over the proceedings.  The supposedly successful result showed how clever diplomacy works to produce words without action.

Not only was the defense appropriations bill backing the garage right in line with this do-nothing policy, but the bill itself represented much of what’s wrong with politics in Washington.

The federal budget consists of three parts: mandatory, discretionary and interest. The mandatory portion accounts for a majority of the budget and covers Social Security, Medicare and other statutory programs.  Interest includes the payments on government debt incurred to cover outlays that exceed tax revenues.  Discretionary spending has two elements: military and non-military.

The defense spending bill covered the military piece.  It was supported by a majority of each party.  The basic political promise of almost all candidates is “jobs, jobs, jobs,” and the bill helps them keep that promise.

The bill is like a Christmas tree, with something under its branches for every state.  Congress often tries to gift wrap items that really have little to do directly with national defense and include them, because the passage of this bill is a virtual certainty.  This is done by limiting them to the defense establishment.

The costs of  BIW garage might ordinarily be covered by the company, the state or the city or all of them together rather than by taxpayers across the country.  Of course, Mainers pay for such benefits to other states.

Under the Democrats, Congress had tried to keep military and non-military spending roughly equal.  After 9/11,  Republicans successfully trimmed non-military outlays while enhancing military funding.

The multi-faceted military budget is contained in a single bill, making it possible to enact questionable items, safe in the knowledge that few in Congress will want to risk seeming to oppose defense.

The garage is a good example of moving some non-military spending into the better protected part of the budget.  Spending that might be challenged in non-military bills and even labeled as socialism is not disputed when it is targeted at defense personnel.

The GOP insists that non-military spending should be covered by many separate bills, making it easier to target cuts in programs similar to those that slip into the defense bill.

The defense spending bill united both parties, though extreme liberals and extreme conservatives joined in voting against it.  Surprisingly, many of them shared the same reason for their opposition.  They wanted to halt the authority of the federal government to spy on communications by Americans.

While the vote on the defense bill looked like a rare case of bipartisanship, broad support for military spending has never been in doubt.  The political risks of opposing it are too great and the benefits for all states are too tempting.  The government’s surveillance authority would have to be reviewed later.

In the end, both COP28 and the defense spending bill were hailed as victories in the self-congratulatory statements of the people who made the deals.  Perhaps they hope we won’t look at them too closely.  

Biden versus Trump? Not so fast.

Gordon L. Weil

Here is the conventional wisdom for 2024.

Joe Biden and Donald Trump will face off as their party’s nominees for the presidency.   The main issue in the campaign will be Trump himself.  The nominees will be selected soon, making most of the year a two-person political war.   Unless a realistic third-party spoiler pops up.

Trump will try to vindicate his claim that he really won in 2020, fend off negative outcomes in his court cases, and gear up a more authoritarian form of government.   Biden will try to save democracy from Trump and to shift the focus to his opponent and away from his aging self. 

The election will be about the people running far more than their policies, good or bad, or their proposals.  The outcome will be close because the electoral vote favors Trump over Biden.

We can count on this.  The polls say so.

As the old song goes, “It ain’t necessarily so.”  As plausible alternatives, here are some unconventional thoughts, if not wisdom.

For the Republicans, the campaign is likely to be a last ditch battle for the remains of the party.  The party machinery has been taken over by Trump, and his backers use it to maintain tight control and defeat traditional Republicans.  We see a divided House GOP delegation that is reluctant to oppose Trump.

For the GOP traditionalists, the fight may be now or never.  They will not form a third party, but will try to return their party to its usual, conservative and constitutional character.   To do this, they need to get behind an alternative to Trump and that looks increasingly like former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. 

The problem for any Trump challenger is money.  Usually, if candidates don’t fare well in early primaries, their backing dries up and they must drop out. But Haley has backing from the Koch political organization, among the wealthiest in the country. She could hold on past early weak primary finishes.  Then the momentum could shift.

Meanwhile, former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney will be trying to elect a Democratic House.  Yes, true.  If the presidential race is close, it could be tossed to Congress, as Trump tried to do last time.  Under Democratic control, he could be blocked.  When a conservative like Cheney will go this far, it’s clear the war for the GOP is on.

Add to that the impact of any court decisions adverse to Trump.  So far, there’s no sign that his standing has been hurt by charges against him.  But verdicts and their cumulative effect are still ahead, to say nothing of Trump’s intemperate reactions.

Biden has suggested he might not be running if it were not for Trump.  Were Haley to succeed in having a real chance at the nomination, she could undercut both Trump and Biden. Not only would Biden no longer need to stay in the race, but he might poll even less well against Haley than against Trump.

Democrats back Biden because they ardently oppose Trump and believe that their incumbent president has the best chance of a repeat win.  But, if the GOP leans toward a younger candidate and a woman, the need for Biden might melt.  Haley’s progress could suggest that a younger Democrat who is a woman would be a better option.

Democrats like most others see Biden as being too old.  Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips is challenging him in early primaries because he thinks Biden is too old to win.  He could garner votes from Democrats who agree.  He could not win the nomination, but he could open the way to contested primaries.

In that case, Vice President Kamala Harris would likely face competition, though nobody wants to undermine the Biden-Harris ticket now.  One serious possibility could be Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer who rebuilt the Democrat coalition there even in the face of death threats.

The expected response to this thinking is that it’s already too late.   The primaries will begin soon and Trump and Biden will quickly nail down their nominations.  But that fails to understand what happens in primaries.  Presidential candidates are not selected; convention delegates are elected.

If conventional wisdom turns out to be wrong, national political conventions could revert to selecting nominees not merely serving as political rallies.   The nominees could be selected by elected state delegates in open votes.  These political “Super Bowl” playoffs alone could help revive the American voter’s connection with the election process.

Of course, these alternate scenarios might well not happen.  But it’s important to understand that the messages from polls and pundits we are now getting may also not happen.  This campaign is for high stakes and is only based on the character of two old men.

Wisdom suggests there are some major political surprises ahead and they won’t be conventional. 

Gaza, COP28, Trump campaign: the subtexts

 

Gordon L. Weil

Daily news reports hide what may be the real news.

By focusing only on the day’s events, we may be misled and miss the underlying reality. This possibility arises on the most central issues these days.

Most important is the war between Israel and Hamas, a terrorist group. Nothing good can be said about Hamas, which is dedicated to the elimination of Israel by the use of terrorism. Israel is right in trying to eliminate it as nearly completely as possible.

A vast majority of Palestinian Arabs in Gaza and the West Bank are not affiliated with Hamas. Yet, in Gaza, Israel justifies killing noncombatants, including children, and destroying cities as the most effective way to destroy the terrorist leadership.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin tried to explain to Israel the basic error in this policy. “In this kind of a fight, the center of gravity is the civilian population. And if you drive them into the arms of the enemy, you replace a tactical victory with a strategic defeat,” he said. Israel maintains that it tries to avoid civilian casualties, a claim denied by observable facts.

Amid speculation on the future of Gaza after the war, one possible answer is overlooked. Israel might want the Arabs out of Gaza so the area could become incorporated into Israel – part of the one-state solution of the Israel-Palestine conflict favored by powerful right wing forces in Israel. To them, leaving residents of Gaza no safe place to live could make sense.

Unless all Arabs are forced out of Israel-Palestine in pursuit of this policy, Austin’s warning must be taken seriously. The area could stand now at the beginning of a prolonged armed conflict. It’s possible that the only way to stop it would be for the U.S. to get much tougher with both Israel and Hamas.

Suppose the leaders of major crime organizations called a summit meeting, inviting the police and FBI, to come up with a plan to eliminate organized crime. At the end of the meeting, the participants could issue a statement describing a phase-down. Innocent people who had suffered because of previously lax crime enforcement would receive compensation.

That’s more or less what has happened in the international climate summits each year. World opinion is supposed to be impressed by high-level commitments made by top officials to slow global warming and aid the innocent. Yet, the use of coal and oil increases. On the surface, lofty goals are shared; in practice, targets are missed. In fact, they are not even seriously pursued.

This year’s COP 28 summit may be the worst. Dubai’s Sultan al Jaber, his country’s oil chief, is the COP chair, but has said, “there is no science out there, or no scenario out there, that says the phase-out of fossil fuel is what’s going to achieve 1.5.” That’s the target limit for global warming this century in Celsius degrees. It has no chance of happening.

At this meeting the clash between al Jaber’s environmental role and his efforts to sell oil reveal the true nature of environmental summits as oil industry trade shows. It’s so blatant that U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres rejected al Jaber’s proposed climate deal, because it “says nothing about eliminating emissions from fossil fuels.”

Donald Trump runs for president and displays great confidence in polls suggesting that he would easily win the Republican nomination and defeat Joe Biden in the presidential election. While most presidential campaigns offer agendas and embody the views of their party, Trump’s GOP has no platform.

His campaign is not about issues, which may explain why he has avoided debates. Trump’s campaign is about Trump. Beating Biden could serve as proof that he won the 2020 election. Biden now signals that he runs mainly to defeat Trump, as if to finally nullify claims about the last election. He would also protect against Trump’s planned vendetta against his opponents.

Facing major criminal trials that could complicate his return to the White House, Trump focuses on delaying final decisions until after his next term as president would end in 2029. For him, the campaign and election are not about becoming president but about what a judge has called his “stay-out-of-jail free” card.

Trump’s lawyers argue that the campaign insulates him, giving him a special legal status. But a federal appeals court just ruled that he could not use his new run for the presidency to claim immunity, noting “his campaigning to gain that office is not an official act of the office.” Still, the lawyers lodge appeals from adverse decisions, trying to run the clock.

Each case – Israel’s action against Hamas, the COP 28 climate summit, and Trump’s campaign – shows that what the principal actors say and what they mean can greatly differ. Their true intent could be dangerous.

Executive branch takes over lawmaking; Court responds

 

Gordon L. Weil

This country still struggles to achieve popular control of government.

In Revolutionary terms, the king would give way to the Congress.  Nice idea, but it’s not working.  What’s even worse, people are growing used to an extremely powerful executive.

The idea behind the Constitution was to prevent the chief executive from controlling everything and instead to give the ultimate power to the people’s representatives.  Legislative bodies would make the laws and presidents or governors would carry them out.

This idea largely failed because of Congress.  From the Civil War onward, it began passing some of its powers to the president and his executive branch agencies.  Congress might normally set national policy, but it would leave the details to the executive.  As issues seemed to become more complex, Congress increasingly left the hard legislative work to “experts.”

Complaints would arise about decisions made by expert regulators, but the Supreme Court deferred to their special knowledge.  It would not overrule their judgments on the facts unless they were completely unreasonable.  The focus of much day-to-day lawmaking shifted to executive agencies and away from elected officials, responsible to the people.

This week, the Supreme Court has heard a case that makes the point. The SEC, the federal securities regulator, charged that a major fund investor had fraudulently overvalued his assets. He faced a trial before an administrative law judge, not a court, who ruled against him.  He was found guilty, heavily fined and denied the right to work in investments.  The SEC approved.

Whatever his guilt or innocence, the investor was “tried” by an official who reported to the agency making the charges.  Congress had given the SEC the right to do that, stripping itself and the courts of their powers.  The Court is now considering if Congress could create this system.

In another major case that will soon be heard, the Court will decide who pays for observers that must be carried on some boats to discourage overfishing.  Congress failed to set a rule, but a federal agency came up with an interpretation that makes the boat owner pay. A lower court deferred to the regulatory body.  The Court will decide if the agency can set such broad policy.

The Supreme Court has begun to see if it can restore the concept that Congress makes the laws and cannot give the executive branch free rein.  Last year, the conservative Court majority departed from its traditional deference to regulators and ruled that Congress had not given the Environmental Protection Agency certain Clean Air Act authority.

Even more significantly, the Court’s conservative majority found that Congress had not given President Biden’s administration the authority to eliminate about $430 billion in student debt.  Political views aside, it was difficult to imagine how any president could spend that kind of money without legislative approval.

Right now, Maine faces the same kind of situation.  The tragic mass shooting in Lewiston merits a review allowing state government to learn if it could have been prevented and to ensure it would not happen again.

Governor Mills appointed a blue ribbon panel of qualified and respected members of the Maine community.  As a creation of the governor, this body has no powers of action.  It can review, report, and recommend, though technically its report goes only to the governor.

No sooner had the group assembled than it asked the Legislature for subpoena powers.  If the Legislature agreed, it would be turning the governor’s commission into an agency with governmental powers.  Yet lawmakers had no role in deciding on the commission, its scope, its budget and its members.  The request was a classic blank check from the Legislature to the governor.

The purposes of the commission are appropriate and necessary.  The membership is impressive. Yet their first act requested a change in status without formal legislative approval of their creation.  They want subpoena power without having encountered any opposition from anyone in providing information.  It looks like they have already decided to assess fault for the shooting.

People’s confidence in government is undermined by the kind of paternalism implied by allowing executive branch officials too much power.  Legislators may say they favor broad policies, but they leave the laws people must accept and follow to people outside of the legislative branch, who are not held accountable by voters.

The answer might be to restore both the power of the Congress and the Legislature and public confidence by passing simple laws that allow few exceptions and are specific in their terms.  Affected parties will complain about losing the treatment they need, almost always to create jobs. They need time to adjust. The latest tax law changes showed its possible.

The problem isn’t about the “administrative state.”  It’s about the failure of legislators to do their constitutional job.

Israel-Palestine, U.S. Congress are zero-sum games

 

Gordon L. Weil

The Israel-Palestine-Gaza conflict and House Republican politics might seem to have nothing in common.  But they do.

Both yield no hope of compromise.  It’s impossible when parties believe they are fighting over a limited resource.  That’s called a “zero-sum game.” When one side wins, the other side must lose.  It’s winner-take-all.

In Israel-Palestine, two groups insist that the conflict there is a zero-sum game.

Extreme right-wing parties in Israel’s current governing coalition want to absorb Palestine into a single country under Israeli rule.  Arabs would be killed, expelled or required to live as second-class citizens.  Israeli Jews, they believe, have an ancient right to a land that was once theirs and that provides them shelter in a hostile world, at its worst during the Holocaust.

On the other side is Hamas, a terrorist group that sees Israel as occupying lands that had been under Arab control for centuries.  Its solution is to kill Jews or terrorize them so they leave. Because it is not bound by international norms, it feels free to rampage at will.

The limited resource in this case is territory. Each side maintains that it has a legitimate claim to all of it.  Some Palestinians and Israelis favor a two-state solution reached through compromise, allowing each side to prosper.  The world community presses for this solution, imposing the concept on Israel and the Palestinians, but without a real effort to make it happen.

Presumably, Hamas saw no chance of its anti-Israel goal being reached and worried that the U.S., some Arab countries and Israel would make a peace deal over the heads of the Palestinians.   So it attacked and refocused the world’s attention.  So far, the only result is a war with innocent victims on both sides.

In Washington, the limited resource is political power.  The slim GOP House majority tries to deny to a Democratic president and Senate the power to appropriate funds or make laws as might be expected to be done by the majority party.  If the Republican goal is to shrink government and keep taxes low, they wield power.

While compromise might advance the national interest, it would deny the House GOP the full force of its power.  While the controversial issues run the full range of the non-military activities of the federal government, they matter less to the GOP than its legislative veto.

This quest for minority control reaches its extreme when GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama blocks all senior military appointments unless he gets his way on a single issue.  Even some of his fellow Republicans believe he has gone too far.  His power, not foreseen by the Constitution, is more important than the nation’s Armed Forces.

In short, the national interest, which could emerge from a compromise, cannot be pursued because of a quest for power.

As bad as both of these conflicts over limited resources – territory or power – may be, they cause something even worse.  Success seems to depend on reducing the opposition to being seen as inherently inferior or evil.

If you agree with Israeli policy, then you may choose to see Palestinians as followers of a different creed that is inferior to yours.  If you see the Palestinians as Israeli victims, then you may hold all Jews responsible for Israel’s policy.  From these attitudes comes Islamophobia and new waves of Anti-Semitism.

If you agree with extreme GOP views, then you may see Democrats as socialists or, even worse, as traitors.  If you are a left-wing Democrat, you may see the Republican right as racist.  Both views are misguided, but make compromise impossible.

In a broader sense, these views, repeated with great passion, threaten society itself.  They can end up holding every member of a group responsible for the views and actions of some members of that group – collective guilt.

Consistent and creative advocates of compromise are missing.  Nobody takes short-term political risks to promote long-term solutions.  That requires advancing proposed solutions, even if they may not ultimately succeed.  They can influence, if not change, the focus of controversy.

The U.S. and Europe could lay out a possible two-state formula for Israel-Palestine, offering more benefit for each side than endless conflict.  Neither side would endorse it, but it could bring about real negotiations. Otherwise, bloodshed will continue, and neither side will prevail.

President Biden could propose to Congress a comprehensive package of proposals on government funding and key policies.  It would not be adopted as proposed, but Biden could be the leader who set the table for negotiations.  Otherwise, government may become paralyzed.

In either case, a compromise could produce results or failure would allow public opinion to assign responsibility. 

Now, two sides ensure that the best for one side is the enemy of the good for both. That’s wrong, because these need not be zero-sum games.

Trump, China’s Xi share policy goals

 

Gordon L. Weil

Donald Trump and Xi Jinping have the same political goal.

For Trump, it’s embodied in his slogan, “Make America Great Again.” Xi’s motto might be, “Make Communism Great Again.” Both want to return to their version of the good old days.

Before the Great Depression that began in 1929, the federal government played a limited role in the country’s economic life and had little to do with social policy. The economy favored corporations, the wealthy and the rising middle class. Social programs were left mainly to private, not governmental, action.

The economic bubble burst with the Depression. Economic growth, much of its based on speculation, could no longer support big business and wild investing. In turn, much of the middle class lost jobs and was driven toward poverty.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, beginning in 1933, gave government a greater role in the economy and social policy. It pumped funds into the economy, creating jobs, and established Social Security and other support programs to provide stability and prevent a similar collapse. His plan included stronger regulation of banking and the private sector.

A tradition of limited government action was replaced by policies giving public agencies key roles in managing the economy, which remained powered by private enterprise. During the massive economic build-up for World War II, the government chose to hire corporate America to produce armaments.

Both major parties had supported the pre-Depression system. With Roosevelt, the Democrats offered the New Deal, a major departure. The GOP remained reluctant to accept a changed role for government, which gained some power to control private sector action.

The benefits of Roosevelt’s approach became embedded in the American economy. For example, few would now advocate ending a national retirement program. But Republicans, led by Trump, would privatize programs and reduce regulation as much as possible.

Such moves would presumably make America great “again.” Trump demonizes those supporting current policies. He sees them as being more dangerous than the dictators he favors. His allies in the House seek to use their slim majority to begin reverting to the past. They try to sell their approach by promising tax cuts mostly for the wealthy.

Former president Bill Clinton once said that Trump proposed to “give you an economy you had 50 years ago, and ... move you back up on the social totem pole and other people down."

In short, making America great “again” is based on the belief that the country was greater before the New Deal and much of modern government should be unraveled.

Xi also looks back to the days when the Chinese Communist Party had the people engage in agriculture and manufacturing that were both managed by the government. Private economic activity would only be marginal. The Party would rule as a dictator on behalf of the people.

Mao Zedong had led the Communist Party to power in China. Deeply devoted to the Communist ideal, he opposed educated people who began to develop ways of thinking that departed from the simplicity of traditional Communism. But his 1958 “Great Leap Forward” was a failure leading to massive famine.

By 1966, he launched the Cultural Revolution, a disastrous back-to-the earth policy. After his death in 1976, the country began to abandon it and to allow the growth of private enterprise.

Deng Xiaoping, Mao’s successor, sought foreign investment and economic development. Millions left the agricultural life that Mao had favored for cities where a middle class began to emerge. Prosperity and greater individual freedom grew under a reformed Community Party.

Xi rejects Deng and pursues a return to many of the values associated with the traditional Party of Mao. He argues that his policy shows the inherent advantages of theoretical Communism over democracy.

He believes that political turbulence in the U.S. and Europe reveals the weakness of Western democracies as they emerged after World War II. He repeats the slogan, “the East rises, the West falls.”

Here is where Xi and Trump are on common ground. They both see the development of liberal democracy as opposing the natural economic system – Trumps’ unfettered individual freedom and Xi’s dictatorship of the workers through the Chinese Communist Party. Both favor authoritarian government, while claiming their approaches are in the best interest of the people.

Both ignore reality. The Great Depression, an economic catastrophe, and the Cultural Revolution, a disastrous failure, were replaced by reforms yielding stability, growth and a rising middle class. Yet the success of these reforms may have dulled popular sensitivity to their ongoing value.

Efforts by leaders to turn the clock back will ultimately fail. People are likely to recognize that the benefits of a combination of private economic initiative and government protection of the common interest are hardwired into their lives. Trump and Xi can make much trouble, but they cannot succeed.

Biden versus Trump might not happen

 

Gordon L. Weil

Get ready for snow.

Before long, the 2024 election campaign will be covered in a thick blanket of speculation.  It will be about as difficult to see through as the blizzard of punditry that blows it in.  Of course, political speculation is likely no better than most 10-day forecasts of the actual weather.  Before I take cover, here are my thoughts about the presidential race.

The big news is that polls show that Trump, the former president, today defeats Biden, the president who beat him, in swing states.   A former president who loses and then wins a second term is unusual.  Only Grover Cleveland did it, back in the 1880s.

The polls have settled nothing.  At least four scenarios are possible for the presidential election, excluding any others in which a third party would be a factor.

The first is the currently anticipated Biden-Trump contest.  This one could produce as a winner the person disliked less than the other.

On the issues, Biden has some strong points like abortion and democracy, but some weaknesses like immigration and inflation.  Both matter less than his age.  He is too old to be president for another five years.  The signs of his aging are evident, though they are ignored by his circle and advocates, impressed with his policies.

Biden suffers from his lack of an essential element of leadership.  Though he reaches out to many constituencies, he does not inspire voters.  Voters need charismatic leaders, and Biden is too laid back or tired.

Trump is in serious legal trouble, and likely to be convicted of more than one criminal violation. His loyal cult sticks with him, but would voters elect a convicted criminal?  Will traditional Republicans surrender their party to Trumpers who place their quest for power above the national interest?

Besides, what are Trump’s current policies beyond an inflated opinion of himself?  In recent statements, he seems to have a declining understanding of both domestic and international issues.

The Biden-Trump contest would boil down to a choice between the lesser of two evils, as it may have been in 2020.

One alternative would be Biden versus another Republican like Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor, or Ron Desantis, the Florida governor.  They benefit from surviving in the GOP field.  Early primaries may make one of them a viable alternative to Trump.  If the court cases undermine him, a possible replacement would be ready.

That likely creates a major problem for Biden.  Running against, say, Haley could change the lesser-of-two-evils calculation.  If Biden faces the potential problem of running against a younger, cogent candidate, he might now have to either reconsider running or make a bold move to shake up the contest.

Though highly risky politically, that move would be throwing open to the Democratic Convention the choice of the vice presidential candidate.  In effect, the winner would be the face of the Democrats against the non-Trump GOP candidate.  The party, not Biden alone, would pick his potential successor.  Biden would remain on the ticket, but there would be a lively Democratic nomination process.

Yet another possible scenario would be Trump versus another Democrat.  That plot could develop if Trump overcomes his legal handicaps and Biden does not overcome the advancing effects of age and leaves the race.

In this case, the Democrats would probably not simply pass the first spot to Vice President Harris unless the need arose only after the Convention.  The Democrats could select Harris or another candidate who was younger and more in tune with the majority of voters than Trump.

The fourth alternative case might be the most appealing.  It would pit a Democrat, not Biden, against a Republican, not Trump.  Each party would go through an open and competitive process to select its nominee. 

The campaign could be mostly about the future and less about past presidencies.  In a completely divided country, with many voters who claim to be moderates but really aren’t, the electorate could be given a choice between two fresh approaches to governing in an age of environmental crisis and economic change.

Maybe the candidates would be forced to debate their policies on immigration, law and the courts, women’s equality and the future of Social Security and Medicare.  While ideology is a driving force for some voters, so-called moderates, the key swing voters, could decide who is more likely to offer practical solutions free from the controversial policies of a previous president.

Admittedly, the alternative cases may be unrealistic simply because of the momentum generated by two presidents and media expectations.  Yet merely accepting a race between two candidates who should have retired could be costly for the country.

These four cases show that today’s self-confident speculating by political analysts might amount to little more than a snow job.  Mine, too.

Classic test of political power of money

 

Gordon L. Weil

In olden times, alchemists tried to turn lead into gold.  They failed.

In 1976, the U.S. decided to convert gold into political power.  It worked.

That year, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that free spending and free speech are the same.  Because the Constitution allows no limits on political speech, the Court said it allows no limits on political spending.

The decision by the unelected justices overruled the massive majority votes in the elected Congress.  Campaign spending took off.  The justices had transformed American politics.

Money now fuels politics. Big money promises to produce big results, and the proof is in the ever-increasing size of campaign spending.   Chances of election victory are tied directly to the amount in campaign coffers.

The Republican National Committee uses only two standards in deciding which presidential contenders are viable: their poll rating and their fundraising ability. Last month, former Vice President Mike Pence dropped out of the GOP race, unable to meet the campaign contribution standard.

Campaigns have become battles for the buck.  Presidential candidates compete for contributions and reject the paltry federal funding meant to level the field.  Congressional incumbents amass dollars early, trying to discourage challengers before they even begin campaigns.  In referendums – campaigns without candidates, the participants focus on outspending one another in getting their message before voters. 

Maine voters are now experiencing a classic case of the power of money in politics.  It is Question 3 on replacing two existing for-profit electric utilities – Central Maine Power and Versant Power – with a nonprofit company – Pine Tree Power.

In public power elections, owners of existing companies have the means to finance campaigns aimed at protecting their investment.  Public power proponents have no profit motive and thus may have much less ability to raise campaign funds.

This is the third public power referendum with which I have some close familiarity.  The others occurred in Maine and in Miami, Florida.  In all three cases, spending by investor-owners swamped advocates of nonprofit, public ownership of a utility monopoly.

In the earlier situations, the incumbent utilities inundated television and print media, while the supporters of change struggled to be seen.  The Miami nonprofit was proposed by the municipal government, prevented by law from spending any public funds to campaign.  It suffered a lopsided loss.

A similar pattern now exists in Maine, where the campaign funds of the existing utilities are more than ten times greater than the resources of the nonprofit’s proponents.  The operating utilities can make their case on television, while the challengers cannot begin to compete in paid campaigning. The question will be settled this coming Election Day.

The Supreme Court has also overturned a congressional majority and declared that corporations have the same free speech rights as individuals and may spend freely in political campaigns.  That decision has increased the flood of political money. 

Independent corporate committees can spend without limit in political campaigns, supposedly because they are outside the control of the political parties or formal participants. To believe that such independence exists requires an act of willful ignorance.

States’ campaign spending rules may differ somewhat from the federal system. But traditional practices and the threat of Supreme Court action to extend its rulings to the states has caused increased conformity with the federal system.

The Court also ruled that each American vote should have equal weight.  But the principle of one person-one vote is a myth when unlimited corporate campaign money has allowed some participants in the political process more power than others.  The ability of a few to influence masses of voters can count more than the assurance that all votes count the same.

The process by which the people make the ultimate political decisions has been both strengthened and weakened over time.  It took constitutional amendments to allow Blacks and women to vote.   But deciding that money is a form of speech, which led to political inequality and the overwhelming power of well-funded corporations, took only a Court order.

The major political money cases came when the Supreme Court overruled Congress.  The Court, using the judicial review authority it gave itself, rejected congressional decisions intended to maintain a level political playing field.

Congress should modify judicial review by the Supreme Court and recover its authority over voting.  Basic American law should not be made by the Court.

In the Question 3 contest, like it or not, Maine voters experience the effect of unchecked campaign spending.  Their only possible action, limited to one aspect of this issue, arises on Question 2, aimed at preventing referendum campaign outlays by foreign governments or their agents.

Citizens are reaching the point where they should decide not only on candidates and campaigns, but if they will continue to accept the domination of American elections by the political power of money.

In Washington and Israel, negotiated compromise essential

 

Gordon L. Weil

The federal government has been paralyzed.

The Middle East teeters on the edge of a major conflict with unknown limits and duration.

Both situations call for statecraft and finding a common ground.  Without that, both situations yield destructive results.

The U.S. problem arises in the House of Representatives. The Republicans hold a narrow majority and can lead only if they are unified.  Their lack of unity is what has created the crisis.

A small group of GOP House members believe that, because their votes are critical to their party’s control, they can insist that all Republicans should give in to their views.  They toppled House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, because he was willing to compromise with a unified Democratic minority.

Their success continued to encourage them to insist on control by the party’s right wing, followers of former president Trump.  For a while, other GOP members would reject their push for control.  The result was a lengthy period with no speaker and no compromise.  That causes a non- functioning government, because the House simply could not act.

The unyielding stance of the Trump loyalists on the right is merely for show.  If they prevailed and fellow Republicans went along with them on urgently needed legislation, a more moderate Senate under Democratic leadership and a Democratic president would not accept their proposals.  The government would be blocked, pretty much where it is now without a speaker.

Because either a Trumpian blockade, now under way, or a House under right-wing domination yields the same non-functioning government, there is only one way out.  There must be a compromise between the Democrats and as many Republicans as are willing to risk their seats to protect the national interest.

The Democrats signaled they were ready for such a compromise, and their demands seemed relatively limited.  They wanted the House to be able to vote on necessary legislation on aid to Ukraine and Israel and on the budget.

The Democrats want a more open process, but do not insist on Republicans voting in line with them.  Compromise would produce results.  Yet the GOP right sees any concession as allowing the Democrats to control the House.  They view the Democrats with so much hostility that any compromise is too much.  Inevitably, they must lose.  The questions are how and when.

In the end, the GOP conservatives won and the GOP elected a speaker. Now we shall see if the House works better.

While the American government was blocked, the situation between Israel and Hamas in Gaza is explosive. That crisis intersects with the fumbling failure of the U.S. government to function even in a situation where there is broad bipartisan agreement.

The crisis arose at this time because Hamas launched an incredible terrorist attack on Israel.  It killed wantonly and took hostages. Its attack was obviously well planned and had no clear intent except to undermine Israel, a country it would abolish.

Understandably, Israel was embarrassed by the failure of its intelligence to foresee the Hamas attack and has responded with great force.  It cannot accept the risk of an event like this happening again.

Israel has gone beyond a military response, subjecting more than two million residents of Gaza to severe punishment to pay for the actions of the militants that control the Gaza Strip.  Israel has cut off supplies of food, medicine, water and fuel. Its philosophy appears to be that Hamas has shown no mercy, so Israel won’t.

The difference between Israel and Hamas is that Israel is an established member of the world community and Hamas is a gang of terrorists.  The Hamas attack and Israeli anti-civilian tactics bring them both to the level of Hamas. The Middle East has fallen into the Middle Ages. 

While Israel’s fury is understandable, its role as nation should drive it to a higher standard.  Instead of negotiating with the U.S. and Saudi Arabia over the heads of the Palestinians, it should pursue a solution with all parties. A permanent impasse, coupled with a continual effort to weaken the Palestinians, has not proved workable.  It produces terrorism and conflict, not peace.

U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres has called for a ceasefire, not because he favors Hamas but because he abhors the waste of human life.  But Security Council resolutions for a pause or a ceasefire were both vetoed. The conflict continues unabated, because the world’s premier peace organization cannot find a compromise.

No political process can function over the long haul unless it includes compromise, even between those holding the strongest sentiments.  This is the responsibility of the people selected to govern. Using force, whether by a critical House cabal or Middle East actors imposing their will without regard for the cost, does not produce the needed workable and stable result.

U.S. government, world affairs in deep crises

Gordon L. Weil

“This may be the most dangerous time the world has seen in decades,” says Jamie Dimon, a top U.S. banker.

American constitutional government halts, blocked by the failure of the Republican majority in the House of Representatives to compromise and resume their role in government.  The process of government becomes hostage to a small group of extreme Republicans, exploiting their power for their own purposes and ignoring the national interest.

The U.S. is the world’s model for democracy.  But the Constitution cannot guarantee that its institutions will work.  That depends on a shared commitment to place the effective functioning of the model ahead of any purely partisan interest.  That commitment, once breached to the point of the Civil War, is once again breached by the deep ideological conflicts of a new civil war.

Donald Trump’s loyalists battle others in their party, producing congressional stalemate.  Meanwhile Trump, the pollsters’ pick for the GOP presidential nomination, goes from one courtroom to another.  Though the charges look serious, he seems immune from political harm and has effectively taken control of the Republican Party.

Democrats rally around Biden and display uncharacteristic unity, not bailing out the GOP.  They see him as their best bet to keep Trump out of the White House, just as they saw Hilary Clinton in 2016.  He suffers from seeming bland in the Age of Celebrity, when it counts to be flashy.  Once again, the Dems see competence as a substitute for charisma. 

At the same time, America’s place in the world is threatened not only by the failure of its government, but by the hostility of its adversaries.  China, together with Russia, Iran and North Korea, strive to show that dictatorship is the natural and workable form of government.  

A new report emphasizes that these four countries have more nuclear capability than the U.S.  Pax Americana, when U.S. nuclear power guaranteed world peace, is gone. While either side can destroy the other, wielding nuclear arms is more a matter of influence than of destruction.

Trump has openly fawned over the dictators in Russia and China, while they stealthily tampered with the American political system.  He envied the authoritarian power of Russia’s Putin and China’s Xi, both of which are now openly threatening.

Trump thought he could charm the North Korean pipsqueak dictator.  He turned Iran, at least temporarily restrained by a nuclear accord, into an immediate and dangerous enemy.  Now, we pay the price.

The growth of the menacing nuclear powers would be bad enough.  But it is accompanied by the failure of the United Nations system to promote and preserve peace.  It was supposed to be the way to end territorial wars, especially in Europe, and to unite the world’s great powers in preventing conflict.

A land war in Europe rages as Russia, once a great power, invades Ukraine, its neighbor.  Countries have stepped up to support Ukraine, as much to draw a line against this kind of territorial expansion as to help a victim of aggression. 

But now the world grows tired of the effort and resumes drifting away from the U.N.’s purpose.  Its Secretary General launches platitudes from the safety of New York, accepting obscurity and enhancing his organization’s irrelevance.  He should have gone to the Middle East, not Biden.

The problem of Israel and Palestine, ripe for settlement by the U.N. in 1947, grows worse.  Israel, founded as a territorial homeland for Jews, deserves to exist free from constant threat.  But full U.S. support for it seems to lead to a nuclear deal with the Saudi dictator over the heads of the Palestinians.   That fires up the Hamas terrorists, who only know how to lash out brutally.

Perhaps even worse over the long term is the increasing threat to life on earth.   Short-term corporate profit and the quest for personal wealth build walls that block our view of the future that will result from the climbing global temperature.

The Wall Street Journal has revealed that, while petroleum mammoth Exxon publicly pledged support for the development of energy alternatives to oil and gas, it actively opposed such efforts and pushed more fossil-fuel production.  It has just acquired a major shale oil company.  Exxon boss, Rex Tillerson, later Trump’s first Secretary of State, was a monumental liar. 

If things are not at rock bottom, we are making good progress getting there.

The problem is leadership.  We don’t have any.

Congress and the White House are led by the elderly, seemingly more intent on holding office than on reform.  Younger people are forced to wait respectfully.  Where are the leaders who speak out with some courage even at the risk of losing elections?  Politics shouldn’t just be a job to be held onto.

It’s time for strong leadership, and that requires new people at the top.

  

Nobel Prizes signal rise of women

 

Gordon L. Weil

Among this year’s Nobel Prizes, four of the six awards went to a woman – two of them without a male counterpart.  The world’s top prizes recognized the role of women in a rare year of multiple women winners.  They won outright the Peace and Economic Sciences prizes and shared with men in Physics and Medicine. 

The stories of two of them, both Americans, reveal both the progress and the obstacles to redressing the exclusion of half the population from leadership and recognition.

Katalin Karikό, who came to the U.S. from Hungary in 1985, was a key scientist in developing mRNA, the basis for the most reliable vaccinations against Covid.  She shared the award with a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, though she could barely gain an academic foothold there.

Her research was so advanced that skeptical funders were reluctant to give her grants.  Instead of stepping up, Penn demoted her and moved her to a remote lab.  After she and her male colleague perfected their discovery, Penn patented it and has made millions.  She got none of the money and went to work for one of the companies that produce the vaccine.

Now, she’s a marginal Penn faculty member.  Penn is glad to claim her as one of its own, but even now it seems a bit cool to her.   She may be more popular in Hungary, where she holds professorial rank, than in Philadelphia, where she doesn’t.  Her counterpart remains a top professor.

Claudia Goldin won the economics prize for her work on understanding the gender gap in employment.  With a career at top universities, she is now a professor at Harvard.

Goldin has challenged the belief that women will gain equal pay with men and to rise to the top of business organizations.   She found that child care responsibilities cut their earnings prospects; she has no children.  She also explored the “blind auditions” for women seeking seats in orchestras and confirmed the discrimination when they auditioned with no screen hiding them.   

Goldin was given tenure, a permanent professorship in 1990, the first at Harvard in her field.  Harvard was founded in 1636 as a men’s college and for most of its history wouldn’t allow women to teach men. Bowdoin College, a Harvard spin-off, was founded in 1794 and followed the same rule.

One of the arguments used against promoting women, Goldin found, was that they were less well educated.  Now, more women than men are getting college degrees, undermining that argument.  It is also linked with changes in American politics.

Among the top 25 states by percentage of college graduates, all but five routinely vote for Democrats.  Those states and D.C. include Maine.   

The last state in this top group is Georgia, now clearly on the cusp and no longer to be counted on by the Republicans. Just ask Donald Trump.  The next group of states includes Arizona, Wisconsin, Texas and Alaska, which may not be far from flipping.

The politics of states with more college graduates may show the increased influence of women among voters.  If that’s true, then as women increasingly outnumber men among college graduates, state voting may increasingly tip to the Democrats.

Some Republicans say their congressional election results were disappointing in 2022 and attribute a shortfall from their expected results to the effect of the abortion issue, which resonated with many women voters.  It may have mattered more than merely serving as a partisan wedge issue.

This possible trend toward more women being educated and more educated voters being Democrats might help explain Republican efforts in states like Texas and Wisconsin to make it more difficult for Democratic voters among the poor to gain access to the ballot box.  If so, this move can only work temporarily at best.

Maine is a good example of the political change that’s taking place.  It is a rare state that once had two women senators at the same time.  It now has one woman and one man in each of the Senate and the House and its first woman governor. The Senate president is a man and the House Speaker is a woman.  The Chief Justice is a woman. 

Congress is also changing, but none of the top eight leaders is a woman, while 29 percent of the House and a quarter of the Senate are women.  Since Congress first convened in 1789, only one, California Democrat Nancy Pelosi, has ever risen to the top.

The courts are doing better. Thanks to presidents of both parties, four of the nine justices of the Supreme Court are women.

Both parties have good potential candidates for the presidency who are women.  What stands between them and major party nominations are old men.   Is it now time for a change?

Voters take control; the referendum wave

 

Gordon L. Weil

Democracy is breaking out all across the country.

Not representative democracy, the hallmark of the Republic, but the original version– direct democracy.  That’s when people themselves decide, legislating in place of their elected representatives.  In Maine and other New England states, many local governments use the Town Meeting, the people’s legislature.  That kind of popular control is becoming, well, more popular.

In Arizona a few years ago, voters grew unhappy with legislatively drawn election districts.  Through a referendum, they adopted an independent districting commission. The legislature sued the commission, claiming that it alone had power over districting.  The U.S. Supreme Court confirmed that the people are the ultimate legislature, and the commission went ahead.

Decision-making by the people had taken off early last century, and the people now adopt laws in 26 states.  The movement grew as populism placed greater trust in average voters than the U.S. Constitution’s drafters had thought wise.  A turning point came when the Constitution was amended to move U.S. Senate elections from state legislatures to the voters.

Early populism favoring government by the people grew under progressive Republican leadership in the Midwest.  That movement also promoted public control of electric power, which helps explain why Nebraska, a conservative state, is dominated by consumer-owned electric utilities and has no for-profit power companies.

In 1908, Maine became the first state east of the Mississippi to adopt popular legislative action.  Voters must approve amendments to the state constitution, as in 48 other states, but, unlike some other states, they cannot propose amendments.  They may also decide by referendum on proposed laws sent to them by state government. 

Maine also uses “initiative,” allowing voters to propose and vote on laws without state government involvement.  This includes the “People’s Veto,” allowing voters to overturn legislative acts.   However, the Legislature can amend initiatives adopted by voters.

Four of this year’s ballot items are initiatives, with three relating to Pine Tree Power, the proposed consumer-owned, non-profit utility.  It was petitioned onto the ballot after Gov. Janet Mills vetoed the referendum proposal of the Legislature. 

Question 3 asks if voters will approve Pine Tree Power replacing CMP and Versant Power as their wires company.

Question 1 asks if voters want to approve major loans by certain entities. It is meant to require a later vote on Pine Tree Power’s borrowing to acquire the utility property, giving the two ousted utilities a second chance to block the new company.

Question 2 asks if voters want to bar foreign government-backed entities from financing future Maine elections.  CMP is owned by a Spanish company and Versant is owned by a Canadian utility. Their role could arise in future votes on new power lines and the loan approval, if it is required.

Question 4, the fourth initiative, would require automobile manufacturers to standardize repair diagnostics.  They oppose it.  Its proponents claim such a law would help independent shops to service new vehicles.

There are four referendums to amend the state constitution.

Question 5 would extend the period for judicial review of written petitions by an estimated 40 days.

Question 6 would require the full text of the state constitution to be printed, not now the case.  Omitted are the state’s treaty obligations to American Indians, inherited from Massachusetts upon Maine becoming a state.

Question 7 would remove the requirement that people circulating election petitions must be Maine voters, bringing Maine into compliance with federal court rulings.

Question 8 would eliminate the current ban on voting by people under guardianship for reasons of mental illness.

If political divisiveness continues to plague the federal government, more key decision-making could be left to the states.  With many Republican red states and Democratic blue states, political divisions could align with state boundaries.

The influence of money in politics does not disappear when referendums are used. As Mainers are experiencing in the campaign about Pine Tree Power, the two investor-owned utilities are far outspending a volunteer band of citizens in an effort to defeat the proposed non-profit utility.

In referendums, unlimited spending can reveal the power of vested economic interests.  That’s less true for abortion, a social issue where politics not profit may dominate.

Last year, the Supreme Court reversed itself on the federal right to abortion, and said the issue was up to the states.  Rather than let either ancient laws or conservative legislatures decide, people resorted to referendums.  In five of six states that voted, popular votes have protected the abortion right.  More such votes are slated.

If political power shifts somewhat to the states, direct democracy there may grow, especially when statewide popular votes could overrule artificial legislative majorities made possible by partisan gerrymandering.   The abortion votes may also encourage the increased use of referendums on other issues in many states.

We could be turning a constitutional corner.

Climate crisis needs all solutions, including nuclear

 

Gordon L. Weil

A U.S. Open Tennis Tournament match was suspended so a climate protester, who had glued his bare feet to the ground, could be removed.

Though his means of expression was extreme, his protest was valid.  The U.N. group tracking progress in halting global warming issued its report almost the same day.  The world is not getting there.

Most countries have set the net emissions goal for greenhouse gasses (GHG) at zero by the middle of the century – just 27 years from now.  With massive understatement, the report says that achieving that “goal requires broad and rapid changes in existing practices.” 

Can anyone seriously believe the net zero goal for GHG – mainly resulting from carbon-producing fossil fuels – will be achieved by then?  The U.S. struggles to cut emissions and begins to try taking carbon out of the air.  Meanwhile China, the next largest producer, keeps adding coal-fired power plants.

Energy to fuel cars, heat homes and run offices and factories will come largely from electricity.  Electric power will have to come from wind, solar and even hydro to make a serious dent in the use of fossil fuels.  Sustained efforts at efficiency, which means using less, are essential but unlikely to cover the gap left by renewables.

There are good reasons for restrained enthusiasm about renewables.  They depend on the weather, which is far from being under human control and perhaps shouldn’t be.  They also are not always available just at the time they’re needed.  Continuous power supply from renewables will require electricity storage that is not yet fully developed.

Ending global warming is a matter of economics.  Oil companies talk a better game about renewables than they play.   Renewables may produce long-term savings and new jobs, but the transition may raise costs and reduce jobs.  And a new world economy increases demand for energy. 

Renewables won’t be enough.  Focusing heavily on them avoids talking about the elephant in the room.  It does not produce carbon. Its technology is available now.  It reduces dependence on questionable energy suppliers like Russia and Saudi Arabia.  It is nuclear power.

Apprehension about nuclear power has two main causes.  The first is the destructive power of the atom revealed by the two bombs that ended World War II.  The second is the demonstrated failure of some power producers to understand how or where to build a nuclear power plant, which caused accidents or even disasters.  Think Chernobyl.

The fear has been so deep that some people want to dismantle nuclear power.  Before it was closed, the Maine Yankee nuclear power plant faced no less than three referendums and prevailed in all.  For some politicians, nuclear power has become an automatic no-no.  The U.N. report, aware of political sensitivities, never uses the word “nuclear.”

Government and industry are learning that building a nuclear generating station is not the same as a traditional oil or coal unit.  In New England, that lesson was learned at the Seabrook plant in New Hampshire.  A unit was put into service only after an experienced nuclear expert replaced the local utility managers.

Industry hasn’t been helping enough.  Discharges of water from the Japanese Fukushima plant may be as harmless as claimed, but they have set back the use of nuclear power.  Many people will not trust a company that hosted a nuclear disaster.  The plant’s name should have been allowed to fade into relative obscurity.  There had to be a better way, even if it cost more.

Concerns are met by government regulators, but the process is slow.  Industry may resist and neighbors may worry.  A more uniform regulatory review process could help.  Federal regulators are developing it, but it remains to be tested in practice. 

The US, UK, Japan and other countries are working to aid the development of nuclear fusion power plants.  Fusion reactors produce little radioactive waste and require small amounts of fuel. U.S. federal aid goes to commercial developers, who seem to be the most advanced.

Even with efficiency, renewables and now nuclear in the works, much needs to be done. New generators and lines must be built. Auto charging points must work faster and be more available.  Storage, from car batteries to wind farms or hydro reserves, must be created. Like nuclear power, they can face local opposition and impose new costs – the price of reversing global warming.

Obviously, the world cannot cling to fossil fuels or bet on a single solution to the climate crisis.   There once was a song, “Wishing Will Make It So.”  Nice kids’ song, but bad public policy.

The problem is that human civilization is now being transformed by climate change. All available solutions must be used.  Renewables, efficiency, and nuclear all impose costs.  So does doing nothing.